


Steps

by RedHorse



Series: Tomarry/Harrymort prompt fills [5]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, Getting Together, M/M, Single Parenting, it’s actually fluff though, references to Tom killing small animals, references to blood play, references to past non con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-28
Updated: 2018-10-28
Packaged: 2019-08-09 02:51:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16441577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedHorse/pseuds/RedHorse
Summary: Lily and Merope meet the day their teenage sons have their first fist fight.





	Steps

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wolf_of_Lilacs](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wolf_of_Lilacs/gifts).



> Thank you to Wolf_of_Lilacs for the amazing prompt and my introduction to the idea of Lily/Merope, which should totally be a thing!
> 
> AND HUGE THANKS to copperkeys of Tomarry discord server fame for beta reading.

Tom and Harry did not meet under ideal circumstances.

Harry’s dad had just died the year before. Tom’s father had finally made good on his threats to send Tom to live with his mother. 

Both boys were at points of transition in their young lives. So when Tom, having bumped into Hermione in the hall, sneered at her and hurled a racial slur, Harry’s heart leapt at the excuse to throw a punch. 

The fight was brief; the boys were pulled apart before a victor could emerge. They were then hauled by their collars to the headmaster’s office by the burly football coach, an inhumanly large and hairy man everyone simply called Hagrid. The Headmaster regarded them sadly over his spectacles and called their mothers.

 Lily and Merope nearly collided with one another in the parking lot. Lily was still in the lingering, final stage of grief where she experienced everything through a sensory bubble, and she had to blink several times at Merope’s long face before she realized that they had nearly had a fall.

 “Sorry,” said Lily. Merope was impeccably dressed. What she lacked in pleasing facial features she nicely compensated for in a willowy body toned as a dancer’s and a wealth of shiny black hair that fell around her face in soft waves. Lily blinked. She hadn’t noticed someone this way since James died, and her response startled her.

Merope nodded curtly. She was distracted by the thought of what was about to shake her already uncertain foundation with Tom, and for the tenth time since the school called that afternoon, she thoroughly cursed Tom, Sr. for putting them in this position. He’d withheld Tom from her so that they had no chance to build a relationship for fifteen years, and now he was throwing the boy into her lap a total mess. A sinister mess, if she was being honest. She was fairly sure she’d seen him burying something in the backyard the previous week, and the neighbor’s cat was reported missing the following morning.

Just a coincidence, surely. 

“After you,” said Merope, and the shorter, curvier woman walked ahead of her into the school. Merope caught herself watching the redhead’s backside too closely, and focused very deliberately over her head after that.

Merope swallowed when she realized that she and the other woman were going to the same place. Two chairs were set a deliberate distance apart in the hallway outside the headmaster’s office. Tom sat in one of them, and a boy with messy dark hair -- and the same clear green eyes as the woman Merope was following down the hall -- sat in the other.

Lovely.

**** 

The second time the headmaster called, Lily didn’t leave the house immediately. Instead she spent a few extra minutes straightening her hair, changing her blouse, and refusing to think about why.

Merope Gaunt wasn’t in the car lot, and the boys weren’t sitting in the hall. Lily walked into the reception area outside the headmaster’s office where his assistant sat and smiled at the petite older woman.

“I had a call from the Headmaster,” Lily explained, and the woman nodded and sighed.

“Mrs. Potter, yes,” she said. “The Headmaster is still visiting with Tom and Harry. Could you have a seat? I’m sure he’ll only be a few more minutes.”

Lily sat. And then she stood up again, because Merope was walking down the hall toward her. Too late she realized how awkward it was, springing to her feet at the sight of a woman she’d met only once, and was only seeing again because their sons had decided to be nemeses.

Merope was, again, elegantly dressed. She wore a black pencil skirt, black pumps, and a crisp, pale blue button-down shirt. Her understated jewelry had the particular muted gleam of the good stuff, obvious even to Lily’s unrefined eye. When she sat in the chair beside Lily’s with a tight smile and crossed her legs, Lily saw a flash of a vivid green tattoo on her left inner thigh.

Fuck, Lily thought frantically.

“The thing about Tom,” began Merope, then stopped. Lily hadn’t expected they would speak, let alone about anything beyond pleasantries, so she blinked and contained her surprise. “His father hates me, and he also thinks he hates Tom, by extension. So Tom is...troubled.” She frowned. She had been looking straight ahead since she sat, but now she glanced at Lily, a cautious openness on her face. “What’s your son’s excuse?”

Lily frowned. She wanted to say “his father’s dead,” but she wasn’t sure that was the right answer. “He’s used to everyone loving him,” she said instead. She thought about the way Harry looked at Tom Riddle, something like disbelief on his angry face. Then, helplessly, she thought about what Merope has just said.

“So you aren’t...close, with Tom’s father?”

Merope snorted and looked straight ahead again. Lily, feeling as though she’d mishandled something delicate, looked at her lap.

“No,” said Merope quietly after a moment, and Lily was once again surprised. Merope had an aloof quality, but Lily realized it was a veneer. They looked at one another for a long moment.

“Lily — or, may I call you…”

“Yes,” Lily said quickly. Merope’s eyes were not precisely symmetrical; her left eyelid was hooded and the right was not.

“Oh. Did you mean…” 

But a door opened somewhere, and an angry shout spilled out. Lily recognized Harry, voice gone high with distress, and rolled her eyes. She thought she saw Merope smile, but she averted her face too quickly for Lily to be sure. Lily strode into the Headmaster’s office, Merope following more slowly.

Tom was sitting, looking up at an animated Harry in amusement, and Harry, further infuriated by this reaction, was literally pulling on his own hair. 

She might not have been alarmed, except that Harry wasn’t wearing his glasses and had a series of red scratches on his cheekbones, as though something had broken against them. 

“You idiot,” she murmured, yanking him about by his shirt collar so she could inspect him, which thankfully shut him up. Harry swallowed and avoided her eye. 

“Sorry, mum. I know they’re expensive.”

Lily rolled her eyes again.

“We’ll pay for the glasses,” said Merope. 

“I don’t…” Lily began, but Merope met her eye and held it. The hooded eye was slightly too still, as though not properly focused, but her stare couldn’t have been more commanding. Lily shut her mouth.

“Tom will pay for the glasses,” she amended.

Lily nodded.

“I’d be happy to,” Tom drawled, gazing over at Harry from where he remained sedate in his chair. “I’ve always been charitable toward the poor and unfortunate.” He turned to his mother and his face was painfully mocking. “I get it from my father.”

Without knowing exactly what was going on, it was still obvious to Lily that Merope took what the boy said like a punch to the gut. But her remarkable composure barely trembled at the hit. 

“I’m glad you agree, Tom. Now go wait in the car.” 

The other four people in the room looked at Tom, who didn’t move at first. He continued to gaze at Merope with flinty eyes and a mocking little smirk that made Lily’s skin crawl with discomfort. When enough time had passed that standing up and leaving the room couldn’t be mistaken for anything but Tom’s choice, he did.

As soon as he’d gone, everyone seemed to release a breath.

In Harry’s case, that breath took the shape of words.

“He won’t leave us alone,” Harry insisted to his mother and Dumbledore. “And none of you believe me! Why don’t you get it, when you can see how he…” 

“Harry,” Lily interjected. “That’s enough.” She glanced apologetically at Merope. “You were both fighting. You’re not innocent here.”

The look on Merope’s face suggested she wasn’t sure, but she didn’t remark on the situation beyond a murmured apology to Dumbledore before she followed her son out of the room.

“Harry,” Headmaster Dumbledore said when the office door swung gently closed and the three of them were alone. “I know that Mr. Riddle can be difficult to get along with. I do believe you. But you must rise to the challenge before you, with the courage I know you to have, and refuse to engage. Recall that the fire that isn’t fed cannot burn.”

Lily and Harry began to wander toward the car park in silence. 

“Harry,” she said eventually. “I don’t know what to tell you, or how I should punish you. If I should punish you at all.” She looked over — and up — at him as they walked. “You’re nearly an adult. If you’re not ready to behave like one, I’m not sure what I can do about it.” 

“Mum,” muttered Harry, scrubbing at his head so his hair stood up. Without his glasses he looked the slightest bit unfamiliar, and Lily realized how right she was. He was growing up, and most of the way there already. She swallowed the lump in her throat. 

“Mum,” Harry said again, and stepped in front of her, effectively stopping them both in the middle of the hallway. He grasped her hands. “I’m sorry. I don’t…” He looked miserable. “I didn’t think. I never want to disappoint you.” His voice cracked a bit, and Lily squeezed his hands.

“You didn’t. Not yet,” she added. “For God’s sake, just don’t make me have this conversation again any time soon.”

Harry grinned, sheepish. “Promise.”

The bell rang and the hall was noisy with students a moment later. Lily released Harry’s hands, and was unsurprised when two familiar faces appeared in the throng letting out of a nearby classroom. 

“Mrs. Potter,” Ron said politely, clearly bursting to speak to Harry. 

“Hi, Mrs. Potter,” said Hermione.

“Hello, kids. I’ll let you all visit a moment, since Harry’s going to lose his phone privileges while he’s suspended.” 

Ron and Hermione gasped.

“Oi, mate, that’s rough,” Ron said, wincing in sympathy.

“Harry, I hope you’ve learned your lesson, you bloody…” Hermione began, then glanced at Lily and blushed. “S-sorry, Mrs. Potter.”

“No phone,” continued Ron, shaking his head. “That’s a tough break.”

Hermione smacked Ron’s shoulder. “Who cares about that? Didn’t you hear that Harry’s been suspended?” 

Lily smiled at the two of them, then elbowed Harry. “Five minutes,” she said in her sternest voice, which wasn’t very stern at all. 

As she stepped out into the sunshine, a glossy black car cruised by, Merope behind the steering wheel. Her son sat in the passenger seat, nearer Lily, his dark eyes fixed in a blank stare. 

What a creepy fucking kid, Lily thought, and felt more grateful than ever for Harry. That she had him at all, and that he was who he was. 

****

In what turned out to be a misguided effort to engender some sympathy in Tom, Merope called Lily Potter to ask if they could join her and Harry when they went to pick up the new glasses. So Tom could pay immediately, and so their mothers could force at least a few minutes of civil interaction.

She had a long call with the school before she finally resigned herself to not getting Lily’s number that way. Then, disgruntled, she tried searching online, and was pleasantly surprised when it worked. Lily was a freelance researcher with a simple professional website which conveniently listed her phone number.

“This is Lily,” was how she answered the phone. Merope was startled. She hadn’t been expecting a secretary or anything given the apparent scale of Lily’s business, but maybe an answering service. Or just a less casual greeting. 

“This is Merope Gaunt,” said Merope, hating how awkward she felt and sounded, then hating herself for caring. The result was a very long moment of silence.

“Oh, hello,” said Lily, still sounding warm, but also surprised. “How’s Tom?”

“He’s...fine.” As far as she knew. Tom had shut the door to his room behind him the previous afternoon when they arrived back from school, and she hadn’t seen him since. It had been eighteen hours.

“How’s…” Merope realized she had forgotten Lily’s son’s name. She was terrible with names.

 “Harry is fine,” Lily said smoothly. “Though he won’t stop harassing me. Apparently a teenager can’t survive with neither phone nor tablet.”

Tom had taken his phone and tablet into his room with him, but there were stacks of books in there, too, which Merope suspected occupied him more than the devices. “Apparently not.” She rubbed the hem of her blouse between her thumb and forefinger. “I was calling because I thought we might meet you at the optometrist. So Tom can pay, as we discussed.”

“Oh. I was going to order them online, to be honest. I can just send the invoice along.”

There was no reasonable explanation for Merope’s disappointment. “Oh, all right,” she said. “Yes. I’ll give you my address.”

She did, and Lily took it down. Merope tried to think of the right way to end the call.

Then Lily said, “Listen, this is probably -- well, you’ll probably say no. But would you like to go to lunch? Some time? With me.”

“Yes,” Merope said, once more filled with nervous energy. “I. Yes. When?” 

“Lovely,” Lily sighed, as though she really meant it. “How about tomorrow? Do you know The Dish, off eleventh street? Half past one, if it isn’t too late?”

Merope hesitated, but only for a moment. “It’s not too late.”

## **** 

The third fight happened when Lily and Merope were on their third lunch outing, which was very inconvenient timing.

Lily snatched the bill off the table before Merope could ask the server to split it.

“I know it’s kind of old-fashioned of me,” Lily said, laughing. “But it doesn’t feel like a real date when we keep splitting the check.”

Merope’s expression was always borderline unreadable, though she’d thawed a bit in the time they had spent together. Now, though, her shock was evident. 

At the sight of Merope’s widened eyes and parted lips, Lily felt all of the blood in her body rushing toward her face. “Oh, God.”

“I didn’t realize…” Merope said.  

While at the same time Lily said, “I’m so sorry, I thought…”

And then Merope’s phone rang. Lily’s was forgotten in the car (which was quite like Lily), and Merope’s was silenced but tucked in her pocket where she would feel it vibrate, just in case (which was quite like Merope).

“Um,” Merope said, reaching into her pocket while Lily put her elbows on the table and her face in her hands, laughing miserably.

“I am such an idiot,” Lily moaned.

“No,” Merope said, but she was frowning at the display on her phone when Lily peeked through her fingers. “I’m...I have to take this. It’s the school.”

Lily sat up, her embarrassment tempered by the distraction, and listened to Merope answer.

“Hello? Yes, this is she. Oh.” She bit her lip, which must have meant something concerning was being said, but the sight of her even white teeth made Lily’s stomach flip over. “Oh,” Merope said again. “We...that is, I will be right there.” She hung up, but didn’t meet Lily’s eye.

“That was about Tom and Harry. They’ve fought again.” Her teeth disappeared and she glanced at Lily for a brief moment, her whole look soft, then looked down. “I’m glad you thought it was a date.” She tapped her fingers against the table, and then reached out and laid her entire hand between them, palm up. 

Lily took it, pleased and dismayed. Merope looked up at Lily’s touch.

“If only our sons didn’t want to kill one another,” Merope said, in the same even tone of voice she said everything. Lily saw a line appear beside the right side of her mouth, and knew this was how Merope teased.

“They’ll get over it.”

A flicker of doubt registered in Merope’s brown eyes. She rubbed her thumb against Lily’s, igniting a burst of electric feeling there, and then she took her hand back with a sigh.

“I hope so.”

# ****

Merope had planned to tell Lily even before, when she had been delighted to think they could be friends, and would not in a thousand years have dreamt of more. Her lingering disbelief over Lily’s feelings was rooted in at least two premises. First of all, there was the fact that one couldn’t go around assuming widows who’d been married to men were interested in other women. And second of all, Lily was the sort of beautiful, charismatic person that made strangers glance over and smile wistfully in the street. Whereas Merope possessed neither beauty nor charisma, unless one counted her ability to command a situation where necessary. That was less charisma, she thought, and more inherited imperiousness from her noble ancestors, and it sometimes turned her stomach to employ it.

But when Lily blushed and called their lunch a date and then shyly took Merope’s hand, it became critical that Merope tell her at once. Not telling a friend was bad enough. Not telling someone -- someone like Lily -- who expressed an interest beyond friendship would be unforgivable.

_Friday, 11:04 p.m._

_Lily: When can I see you? I want to touch you. Will you let me kiss you?_

_Saturday, 12:01 a.m._

_Merope: Yes._

_Saturday, 12:02 a.m._

_Lily: When?_

_Saturday, 8:35 a.m._

_Merope: Tom goes to his father’s this weekend; Sunday afternoon._

_Saturday, 8:40 a.m._

_Lily: Harry is studying with Hermione that evening. 5:30?_

_Saturday, 11:00 a.m._

_Lily: Am I pressuring you? Please say no if you would rather wait. I can wait._

_Saturday, 11:01 a.m._

_Merope: No, you aren’t. 5:30 tomorrow will work for me._

 

Merope nervously changed her clothes three times. Lily always dressed casually, but Merope only had beautiful clothing to make herself easy to look at. And her hair; her one vanity. She took extra time with it. She noticed, in hindsight, that Lily had admired it when it was loose. She knew it was a waste of time, that disgust was the only possible reaction to what she had to say, no matter how she looked. But she couldn’t help it, and in the end she was glad. It warmed her to see Lily’s eyes lit up at the sight of her, and touched her to see Lily wore a soft pink blouse rather than a t-shirt, and instead of her usual ponytail, her hair was freshly blown out.

“I should have asked,” Lily said by way of greeting. “But I don’t even know what you eat. You could be a vegetarian.”

“I’m not.”

“Or maybe you have allergies.”

“No.”

Lily flushed and smiling was nearly too much for Merope. She looked past Lily into the house, which was tidy and unpretentious.

“I’m sorry, I’ve left you stranded on the stoop.” Lily hastily backed away from the threshold. “Come in?”

Lily smelled good. Even better than the perfume of the food, which involved baked cheese, if Merope trusted her nose.

“I didn’t expect you to have cooked,” Merope said awkwardly. “I didn’t bring anything. I just wanted to talk to you, and I thought it should be in person.”

“Oh,” Lily said, looking confused. “I’d like to talk, too. And, if you still wouldn’t mind…” she started forward, with that combination of bold action and shy demeanor that Merope couldn’t parse, except to know she liked it very much.

Merope closed the door and leaned back against it, hating herself a little, but unable to refuse what she expected would be her only chance to kiss Lily. So she helplessly grasped Lily’s waist with both hands when Lily put a hand on her shoulder and levered herself onto her toes. Lily’s kiss was brief, warm and sweet, and Merope kept her eyes open. Lily had a faint pattern of freckles visible at very close range, and her eyelashes were much longer than Merope had thought, only they faded to a sort of golden copper at the tips, which made them hard to see from any distance.

Lily leaned back on her heels, her hand lingering on Merope’s shoulder, and fingered the silky fabric there. “What a pretty blouse.”

Merope had never felt weak with lust at such a simple touch. Or — she wasn’t even sure it was lust. She wasn’t sure what she wanted to do with Lily, apart from smelling the warm skin of her neck, counting her every freckle, learning her taste. All she was sure of was that the door was the only thing holding her up. 

“We could, um, not eat,” Lily suggested, inching nearer. Her small, warm hand tentatively touched the nape of Merope’s neck, and Merope almost involuntarily slid her hands from Lily’s waist up her back, though whether she meant to resist or encourage, she wasn’t yet sure.

“I…” Merope started, but fell into flustered silence when Lily leaned in to kiss her again.

This time when their mouths parted their bodies remained close. Merope held Lily firmly against her with a hand on the small of her back, while with the other she cupped the side of Lily’s face, her always-cool fingertips in Lily’s satiny hair, startled by the warmth of her scalp.

“I need to tell you something, too,” Lily murmured, nosing aside Merope’s open collar to press her lips against Merope’s collarbone, speaking against Merope’s skin. “I — James and I were together in school. And he’s the only...I haven’t…”

 “Ah,” Merope managed, the implications of Lily telling her this now making it hard to think, let alone speak. “Lily,” she tried again, fingering a strand of Lily’s hair that had fallen into her face. “I have to tell you something. Something horrible.”

# ****

Harry didn’t hate Tom Riddle on sight. When Harry first saw him he mostly thought he was fit, but really Harry found a lot of people attractive. It was part of being fifteen years old and unabashedly bisexual.

“I’ve just had class with the new kid,” Ron said, joining Harry and Hermione at lunch. He had his tray heaped with food and began eating before he finished talking, which made Hermione pretend to stab herself with her butter knife.

“How did he seem?” Harry asked, noting that the boy in question hadn’t appeared in the cafeteria yet.

Ron opened his mouth, which was full of peas, to respond, and Hermione sighed explosively at Harry. 

“What did I do?”

“You’re encouraging him! Ron, chew and swallow, then speak, if you please.”

Ron obeyed, then looked at Hermione reproachfully. “I have to stay committed to my lunch, or I won’t finish it in time. Do you want me to starve? And what about my afternoon classes? Weren’t you just telling us that people who are hungry can’t learn properly?”

“You’re disgusting. But I’ll leave you to it, because I have a committee meeting.”

When Hermione was gone, Ron reapplied himself to his food, and filled Harry in on Tom Riddle around mouthfuls of mashed potatoes.

“Quiet, thinks highly of himself. Seems to know Malfoy.”

Harry grimaced. “So, not exactly one of ours, then?”

Malfoy was the sort of prat who belonged in a private prep school, but attended public school because his father was in politics. Malfoy lorded his father’s influence over everyone at any opportunity, including the faculty, who reluctantly bowed most of the time.

Harry didn’t think much about Tom Riddle after that, until he saw him walking toward Harry and Ron while they waited for Hermione to leave her last class. She hurried toward them from the same direction as Riddle, and even from a distance it was obvious she was furious.

“That prat,” she hissed as soon as she was near enough for them to hear. “I just had class with him, and you should have heard what he said about affirmative action.”

Harry, brows raised, looked past her at the alleged prat, who had his hands in his trouser pockets, a very nice leather messenger bag slung over his shoulder. He was more fit the longer you looked at him, but since Hermione was upset, Harry frowned when their eyes met.

Tom Riddle paused directly behind Hermione, who seemed to sense that he was there. Before she had fully spun around, Tom Riddle spoke, looking directly at Harry instead of at Hermione. Though there was no mistaking who he was talking about, he said it as though she wasn’t even there.

“Every little brown girl thinks she’s special,” murmured Tom Riddle. And as though of its own accord, Harry’s fist flew out and connected with Riddle’s jaw.

The fight was brief and crude, but glorious. Tom yanked out a handful of Harry’s hair, and Harry’s flailing fists were badly formed — he sprained his thumb and his fingernails cut welts in his own palms.

Harry thought of nothing else for a week. He wanted  to leave bruises on every inch of white skin, throttle until he quieted every self-satisfied laugh, make the smirking mouth bleed. 

But the second fight wasn’t like that. It happened without an audience -- just at an intersection in the hallway, when Harry was almost late. Tom was leaning up against his locker with his arms crossed. He didn’t even say anything. Didn’t even smile. He had an empty, sinister expression. Harry shuddered and Tom arched a brow.

Well? he seemed to ask.

Harry answered with a growl, launching himself at Tom and shoving him against the lockers. Tom snarled back, and they grappled with their bodies tight together until Tom got Harry’s arm behind his back and slammed him into the lockers face-first. He had his feet inside Harry’s, his hips against Harry’s arse. Harry tasted blood in his mouth and felt the broken lenses of his glasses cutting his face. He also felt a shock of awareness coursing over his body. And the heat, pins and needles, that he’d learned to recognize as the precursor to an erection. 

So he did the only thing he could think of. He relaxed, confusing Tom, and when Tom’s grip loosened just enough, he crossed his arms and jerked upward to break Tom’s grip. Then he spun around and kneed Tom hard in the balls.

They had an uneasy peace after that, primarily because Harry was loathe to make physical contact and Tom’s cut his sneers and remarks at least in half. Harry was mostly convinced his horrifying reaction had been some kind of biological accident, but didn’t want to chance it happening again. Also, he was less outraged by Tom’s general bigotry. Harry was beginning to think that his comments had little to do with Tom’s philosophies, whatever they might be. Tom just wanted to fight and get in trouble, a classic attention-seeking pattern.

The third fight might never have happened if Harry hadn’t lingered after football practice to change the laces on his cleats. But while he was there, he inadvertently overheard Malfoy and Tom speaking. Tom wasn’t a football player, so Harry was startled to see him in the locker rooms. But there he was, looming over Malfoy, who had his blond head bent, and a few grass stains on the back of his white t-shirt that Harry was proud to take credit for.

“I thought we’d been through this times enough,” Tom said, and Harry realized he was stroking Malfoy’s head, which made no sense. Not until Malfoy leaned forward and pressed his forehead up against Riddle’s thigh, an unsteady breath shuddering through his hunched shoulders, and slowly lifted a hand toward the button and fly of Riddle’s trousers.

Despite himself, Harry gasped, and Tom’s head rose and he looked Harry dead in the eye.

Malfoy must not have heard, because he was easing down Tom’s zip until Tom’s hand swiftly closed over his fingers.

“I’ve just recalled a prior engagement,” Tom said quietly, holding Harry’s eye in an unwavering stare. That vacant, reptile’s stare. Harry swallowed. Malfoy leaned back, and made as though to turn his head, though Harry was still sure he didn’t know Harry was there. Tom held his hair, looked at Harry with an arched eyebrow, and Harry flushed and stumbled a few steps backward so he was on the other side of the row of lockers and out of sight.

There was no way for Harry to get out of the locker room without Malfoy knowing someone had been there, and for whatever reason, Harry didn’t want that. He wasn’t sure whose feelings he was protecting -- Malfoy’s or Riddle’s -- and either answer seemed absurd. He heard Malfoy and Riddle exchange a few parting words, and the scrape of the heavy metal door sliding across the concrete floor to open, then close. Three long seconds passed and then Riddle’s voice floated through the room, deep and faintly echoing off all the hard services.

“Come out here, Potter.”

Harry did. He awkwardly faced Riddle, who calmly did up his trousers, the only sign he was the least bit affected a tautness to his jaw.

“No one would believe you, you know,” he said, icy. “And Malfoy’s father could make things very difficult for you.”

“I’m…” Harry was confused. Why would he tell anyone something that was so clearly none of anyone’s business except Riddle’s and Malfoy’s? And why did he get hard when Riddle tried to break his face against a locker? That made less sense than the fact he was hard now — seeing (well, almost seeing) a real-life sex act would have that effect on any teenager. Surely.

Then it dawned on him why Riddle’s glare was steely and he wasn’t trying to fight. He looked considering and defensive instead.

“You’re not out,” Harry blurted.

Riddle’s eyes narrowed. “What do you want, then, to keep your mouth shut? And let me warn you, I don’t have access to my father’s money.”

“I don’t…” Harry couldn’t contain his horror well enough to verbalize it. Tom Riddle thought Harry was going to blackmail him with over his queerness? Harry wore a bisexual pride pin on his winter coat. Their teachers always carefully called on him upon when a subject so much as hinted at an LGBTQ theme.

“Well,” Riddle sneered, looking more like himself. “Be sure to let me know when you decide. Maybe I can arrange for my mother to give it to yours. Though your mother is such a gold-digging whore, you probably can’t trust her not to just keep it for herself.”

This fight was the longest yet, featured 0 erections, and it only ended when they were too exhausted to continue.

They lay next to one another on the hard floor, chests heaving, no longer touching. Harry wiggled a loose molar with his tongue and grimaced at the rush of metallic-tasting blood that filled his mouth. When he coughed his ribs ached and stung like they were bruised. His arms burned from swinging and his right hip throbbed from the part of the fight where Tom had kicked his feet out from under him and he’d dropped like a stone, unprepared.

“I suppose,” Riddle said, when Harry had almost caught his breath, “that we should go to the Headmaster’s office.” 

Harry flinched, miserable at the look he knew he’d see on his mother’s face. But Riddle was right. They couldn’t go back to class bloody and limping, and he’d probably already been marked down as absent. In hindsight it was hideously irresponsible, skipping class to eavesdrop and then...whatever that had been. It didn’t feel like fighting. At the end they’d both been so drained they were more or less rolling back and forth, hissing curses at each other between labored breaths.

They stood up without looking at one another and walked out of the empty locker room and into an equally empty hallway. Harry felt indignation flaring in him again at the exchange they’d had just before this round of punching started. 

“I won’t fucking tell anyone, you arse,” Harry muttered. “Honestly, don’t you —”

He paused, because he’d been about to say “don’t you know me at all?”

But of course, Riddle didn’t. Harry stopped and removed his glasses, preparing to wipe them on his shirttail, as he often did when he was flustered.

Riddle made a displeased sound, however, and snatched them from Harry’s hand.

“You’ll scratch the lenses,” he muttered, reaching into his pocket and drawing out an actual handkerchief, fine linen and embroidered with his monogram in green silk thread. Riddle’s middle initial was “M.” Harry gaped. Riddle polished his glasses carefully, holding them up to the light to be sure he hadn’t missed anything, then handed them back.

Harry blinked, then took them and put them on and blinked again.

“Er. Thanks.”

“Mmm. I did pay for them, didn’t I? I’m simply protecting an investment.” He was studying Harry, so Harry looked back, uncertain but interested in the new expression he found on Riddle’s face. He looked curious, and his usual malevolence was absent. Harry bit his lip and hastily looked away, resuming walking toward the Headmaster’s office with his head down. He heard Riddle’s footsteps behind him, but didn’t look at the other boy again.

He thought about what Riddle had said -- “gold digging whore” -- and reconsidered his moment of confused, but positive feelings while Riddle had cleaned his glasses. He was not complicated, Harry reassured himself. He was a bigoted piece of shite, and nothing more.

Then he saw their mothers standing together outside the Headmaster’s office, and something else about that remark took on a new meaning. “Maybe your mother could give it to mine.” Lily was standing close to Merope, though they weren’t touching, and had her head tilted back to listen to whatever Merope was saying.

It was perfectly innocent, but Harry knew, just looking at them, that something was going on between them. His feet stopped moving seemingly of their own volition and he was frozen in the hallway. Riddle stepped around him with a dry chuckle.

“Honestly, Potter. You’re incredibly dense.”

# ****

Tom knew better than to hold his mother’s natural limitations against her. There was no point in punishment if it couldn’t steer the recipient’s future course. But there was a deeply satisfying -- if fleeting -- spark of emotion in his chest when he hurt someone. Hurting with words was almost as dizzying as he thought it would be to hurt with a knife.

(Almost. There was only one way to be sure. He thought he might be able to get Malfoy to let him try a bit of bloodplay. Malfoy was so eager to please.)

The day Harry Potter grappled with Tom in the locker room was a Friday, and that Sunday was the third Sunday of the month, which meant that Tom Riddle, Sr., sent a car over to pick up Tom from Merope Gaunt’s downtown flat. The driver was Tom’s least favorite, a man named William, who took right turns too fast and who also gave Tom dirty looks when he thought Tom wasn’t looking. He didn’t think Tom, a rapist’s child, should have access to such accoutrements, Tom had overheard him telling an assistant housekeeper when Tom was twelve. 

If Tom had told his father, William would have been sacked. Not out of any kind feelings for Tom, but because it infuriated Tom Riddle, Sr., for anyone to reference the circumstances of his son’s conception. But to tell might imply that it had meant anything to Tom, and why should it? A recitation of facts had no power over him. Tom’s mother was a rapist. She was also his sole source of old, noble blood and a defunct title that it would do him no good to claim. The parent he thought might love him, but whose love served the least purpose. A long list of dichotomies, was Merope.

He slowly packed his overnight bag, contented by the idea of William waiting and stewing, while recognizing the right turns would be sharper the more impatient William grew. Merope waited in the hallway, her arms crossed, already dressed for the day, as impeccably as ever. She wouldn’t be out of place in a corporate boardroom. But of course, Tom Riddle, Sr., had ensured she would never work in a place like that. She just had her job at the little government-run lab, where she was the only one who never wore grubby jeans and trainers.

“Mother,” Tom said coolly. He absently fingered the place on his forearm that bore a row of finger-shaped bruises from the locker room altercation, and the feeling of the pressure there slid over his entire mind like a balm.

“Tom,” she replied in a very similar voice. “I will see you Monday afternoon, if you’d like for me to pick you up from school.” 

“Malfoy will have a car,” he replied, glancing down at his fingernails. “Is that all?”

“Yes,” she muttered. “Enjoy your day with your father.”

Tom snorted. “Of all the ridiculous orders you could give me.” 

He brushed past her, trotted down the stairs, and walked out of the house grinding his teeth and not sure why. Something about Merope always set him on edge. It had always been this way, since he was a young child and his father raised the concept of his mother in every conversation about mistake and punishment. She was a phantom that his father shackled to him, and now he was here, living in her den. There were probably valid reasons a psychologist could give him for why he imagined her ugly face when he peeled the skin off of the rats he sometimes managed to catch in the alley when he set out the garbage.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t afford to open a window into his head for anyone. When his father had sent him to therapy at seven years old, he’d drawn a scene of mass execution during the creative exercise. Tom quickly learned that those processes were less confidential than advertised.

“William,” he said crisply, sauntering down the stairs to the sidewalk even more slowly than he would have under ordinary circumstances, pleased to see the driver grinding his teeth.

“Mr. Riddle,” he said tightly, and they stared at each other for a long second, in which Tom refused to open his own door, before William finally did it for him.

He deeply inhaled the scent of leather. He knew the trappings of wealth didn’t matter objectively, but he couldn’t contain the visceral response he felt when he surrounded himself with them. Contented, it would never be, but at least the clamoring animal that lived in his head and craved respect could be fed. Deference was also good. It was the only thing that pleased him about Malfoy: the sense he had of possessing a servant.

Tom enjoyed the car. He found it relaxing. He liked to lean his forehead against the tinted glass and feel the shuddering vibrations between the machine and the road, such intense energy and speed all reduced to a barely detectable thrum, especially in the kind of cars his father owned. Yet it was not contentment.

The nearest he’d come to contentment was the moment, bruised and bleeding, when Harry Potter was finally too exhausted to dig in an elbow or effectively wrestle for another moment. There had been a second, or two, where Potter was heavy on Tom’s chest, his entire body lax, the violence of the preceding minutes leaving them both drained of vitriol. The animal had sharply taken note. Then Harry rolled away, and the animal was back to its ordinary, ever-restless behavior.

The memory brought a measure of relief, though. Particularly when Tom rolled back his sleeve and ran his fingertips over the handprint there, turning blotchy purple where it had first been deep red. He leaned back, stroking the mark so that he could feel it throb, and revisited a fantasy he’d had of drawing his name in Malfoy’s pale chest with the tip of a knife. But this time instead of Malfoy sprawled under him, it was Harry. And Harry held the knife between them and deftly sank the tip through Tom’s skin, so that blood welled and dripped from Tom’s chest to Harry’s.

Two feelings warred in Tom. One in furious, principled denial, and the animal in snarling delight.

Fortunately it was just in Tom’s mind that these thoughts were explored. There was no window, and if there were, he would not open it.

# ****

Lily had always felt that she was, at her core, a good person. But there had also been moments of doubt.

The first was when she gave herself permission to abandon her childhood friend, whether he deserved it or not.

The second was when her sister’s husband had a stroke, and Lily cited their estrangement, and never called.

The third was when she listened to Merope Gaunt’s story in silence, then politely asked her to leave. 

The third was less of a moment, and more of a period. She did not wrestle with the situation so much as it came over her, again and again, in a wave. She staggered against it, not knowing anymore which direction the tide was pulling her toward the ocean, and which direction it was pushing her toward the shore.

Lily had a moral compass—her oldest friend Marlene—but she didn’t call her because she worried she would get an answer she didn’t want. Or rather, she needed to know which answer she wanted before she dared to ask.

And by the time she figured that much out, she didn’t need a sounding board after all. She was all grown up, apparently, or as close as she was ever likely to get.

So she just texted Merope instead.

 

_Thursday, 3:05 a.m._

_Lily: I’m sorry._

_Thursday, 3:05 a.m._

_Merope: No. I’m sorry. I should have told you sooner._

 

Lily began to type “maybe,” and stopped. She began to type “no you didn’t,” and deleted that also.

 

_Thursday, 3:10 a.m._

_Merope: I didn’t think I’d hear from you again._

_Thursday, 3:11 a.m._

_Lily: neither did I._

_Thursday, 3:12 a.m._

_Lily: When I was thirteen, my best friend brought a pipe bomb to school. It didn’t go off, and I know if he’d wanted it to, it would have. But I never spoke to him again._

_Thursday, 3:15 a.m._

_Merope: I wouldn’t have either._

_Thursday, 3:16 a.m._

_Lily: I should have. I regret it all now. He was much more than that mistake, even though it was a terrible fucking mistake to make._

_Thursday, 3:20 a.m._

_Merope: I don’t know how to talk about this, this way. Can I call you?_

_Thursday, 3:30 a.m._

_Merope: Lily? I’m sorry. That was too much to ask._

_Thursday, 3:31 a.m._

_Lily: No. I want you to. Please call._

 

They spoke on the phone ten minutes that night, twenty the next, and three hours the night after that. Lily yawned through her online consultation the next day, grateful that the person on the other end of the webinar couldn’t see her. Harry appeared in the latter ten minutes of the consult and stood at the counter shoving slices of buttered bread in his mouth until Lily’s call ended and she interrupted him.

“Didn’t sleep well?”

Harry shot a hunted look over his shoulder, left cheek stuffed with food. She held up a hand.

“Please, don’t answer that. And if you do, please consider chewing, and swallowing, first.”

Harry rolled his eyes, but she could tell he meant to be good-humored, so she let it go and studied him curiously. He’d been mercurial lately, which wasn’t like him. She’d tried to find a causal connection for his mood swings and drawn a blank. She caught herself almost texting Hermione — but questioning his friends would surely be unforgivable.

“Is everything all right?” The helpless parent’s generic question.

Harry shrugged, swallowing the mouthful of food with some difficulty, then smiled briefly before taking another slice and folding it over. “It’s all fine,” he assured her. The detached teen’s generic answer.

“You’re going with Ron today?”

Ron worked in his brothers’ shop on Saturdays and it was rare for Harry and Hermione not to tag along, keeping Ron company and revising in the break room.

Harry looked away, reaching for the bread again. “No. I’m going hiking with Ginny. Didn’t I say?”

“Are you taking the train? And —I thought things were over with Ginny?”

Harry shrugged. “We’re just hanging out.”

Right. Romance these days consisted of “hanging out.” Incredibly awkward revelations in the living room. Texting in the middle of the night. 

“Well, let me when you get there and say where you are. Then I can come for you if you get lost.” She winked, but of course he wasn’t looking at her. “Hopefully before the lions and tigers and bears can get you. Harry.”

He had his hand on the door to the back garden, but paused and turned when she said his name.

Lily got up to come over to him, brushed his hair back and kissed his forehead. He looked at her with a worried frown.

“Are you alright, mum?”

Lily nodded. “Give Ginny my love. And I need to talk to you about something when you get home, so don’t be too late.”

She watched him step outside, and when his sleeve fell back as he caught the edge of the door to swing it back closed, she thought for a brief moment she saw a perfect set of human teeth marks on his wrist.

Surely just a trick of the light.


End file.
